Comment by scoofy
3 years ago
When there is nothing beyond death, there is no death. We won’t be sitting on the sidelines blindfolded. We won’t exist. From our perspective the death never actually happens.
I’m surprisingly okay with my lack of experience of the billions of years before the earth existed, and I won’t experience the billions after.
That said, just because we can’t stay at Disneyland forever, we might as well go on the rides while we are here.
We are all dying. Some sooner than others. As a student of philosophy, this perspective has driven me to avoid the common status concerns that many people chase.
All though you're correct it is rational to not fear death. I personally, and likely many other people here, have a very very strong aversion to it.
I DO NOT want the cessation of experience.
Ideally, I'd like to continue in perpetuity, to see the sun rise from Venus, or visit my tenth generation offspring on Saturn.
All of those missed experiences would be deeply saddening. To see our species conquer to universe, to see intelligent life bloom in the darkness of space, that is the goal.
I would also like to continue in perpetuity, it's why maintain general fitness and I generally avoid some life-shortening things like smoking (though I do consume alcohol). The problem is that life in perpetuity doesn't actually happen even from treatments of even our wildest sci-fi fictions. By extending life, we merely kick the can of death down the road...
Actual immortality achieved would just push concerns to the heat death of the universe, and folks acting as Cyber-Punk Holden Karnofsky would be spilling ink about the need to invest in star-moving technology to create a big crunch. I don't mean to be trite here. The point is 10 years, 100, years, 1000 years, or 100 billion years, the dilemma is the same, because the linearity of time means any non-infinite amount of life is ultimately minuscule.
The psychological dilemma of existentialism is a challenging one, I'll fully admit that. It's one I've accepted. The benefits also exist though. It forces you to live in the moment to some extent, when others are solely focused on the future.
> I DO NOT want the cessation of experience.
What you want isn't always what you get. There are a lot of people that have all kinds of urges that they know aren't going to happen. That's perfectly normal, but for so called 'rational' people that fraction that has these irrational desires is a bit strange to me. Rationally: everything dies, sooner or later, and so will you. So the way to get the most out of it is to make sure that you make every minute count.
The cessation of experience is not so bad when you're asleep. It wasn't so bad before you were born.
I'm not overly concerned about death on its own (I feel it's going to be kind of like being asleep), neither am I that concerned about my role in the universe. Instead, I feel more for people who truly suffer in life maybe due to poverty, or due to disease, etc. who don't get to go on Disneyland rides. It makes me feel what was the point of it all? It has to be teaching us a lesson beyond the "simulation" and if not -- that's what makes me sad -- not my personal fear of death, or anything to do with status.
And even to a lesser extent -- why do we suffer -- is it a law of physics that can't be bent? I don't agree with people who believe more pleasure equals more pain. There will be people who live amazing lives, and those who don't. And so I feel that we as intelligent beings can reduce randomness, and take control of our environment and make sure we can all go on Disneyland rides at least to some extent, and hopefully eventually figure out what's outside of Disneyland.
I completely agree. Ironically, the existentialist should be more concerned about general welfare, not less. There is no afterlife to set things right. We should not be surprised that ethical hedonists like Peter Singer are so concerned about animal welfare.
We suffer almost certainly because it's an evolutionary adaptive feature for us we picked up somewhere along the way. It is no surprise that the general suffering we find in developed countries, namely loneliness, is directly related to human reproduction.
Is it a generally happy or sad state of affairs? Who's to say. It's our state of affairs, and we best do what we can to make the most of it.
I'm not scared of death. I'm scared of an extended painful exit.